page_title: Automotive industry in France
section_title: 1900 to 1950
hierarchical_section_title: Automotive industry in France / 1900 to 1950
caption_attribution_description: 1937 Delage D-8 Coupe Aerosport by Letourneur et Marchand Desert Classic Concours d'Elegance 23 February 2014.
context_page_description: France was a pioneer in the automotive industry and is the 11th-largest automobile manufacturer in the world by 2015 unit production and the third-largest in Europe. It had consistently been the 4th-largest from the end of World War II up to 2000.
  France is home to two major automaking companies:
  PSA Group the 2nd-largest automaker in Europe and the 11th-largest of the world in 2015.
  Renault Group the 3rd-largest automaker in Europe and the 10th-largest of the world in 2015.
  Additional lesser automotive manufacturers in France include:
  Bugatti, a luxury marque of the Volkswagen Group headquartered in Molsheim.
  Venturi, a small sports car manufacturer and Formula E team sponsor.
  Aixam and Mega, microcar marques of Polaris Industries headquartered in Aix-les-Bains.
  Microcar and Ligier, microcar marques of DrivePlanet headquartered in Abrest.
  The France-based Renault Trucks is a major producer of commercial vehicles and is owned by Volvo AB. Both PSA and Renault produce a large number of vehicles outside France.
context_section_description: 1903 - France remains the world's leading automaker, producing 30,124 cars (nearly 49% of the world total) as against 11,235 cars produced in the USA.
  1903 - Hotchkiss et Cie is founded.  The company is bought by Peugeot in 1950, but discontinues auto production by 1955.
  1905 - Delage is founded by Louis Delage.  Company is bought by Delahaye in 1935 but ceases auto production in 1954.
  1910 - Ettore Bugatti started the Bugatti company in Molsheim (then in Germany, now in France).  Production ends in 1956.
  1911 - The French branch of Hispano-Suiza is founded.  Auto production is ended in 1938.
  1919 - Avions Voisin is founded by Gabriel Voisin.  Production ceases in 1939.  After the war, Voisin designed a microcar, the Biscuter.
  1919 - Citroën founded by Andre Citroën.
  1920 - Darracq (founded 1896) merges with Sunbeam and Talbot, creating what eventually became Talbot-Lago in 1935.  Company is bought by Simca in 1959.
  1921 - Amilcar is founded.  The company merges with Hotchkiss et Cie in 1937 and ceases production in 1939.
  1921 - Salmson begins auto production.  In 1957 the company is bought by Renault.
  1929 - French annual automobile production peaked at 253,000 passenger cars, a level that would not be matched till after the Second World War.
  1933 - With French passenger car production at 140,635 units, France lost its place as Europe's top automobile producer to Great Britain 220,775. The French roads nevertheless reflected three decades during much of which the French auto-industry had led the world, with a "car parc" of 1,448,000, ahead of Britain which had 1,210,880 cars registered and of Germany with only 510,680 cars.
  1934 - Simca established by Henri Pigozzi to build Fiat cars.
  1934 - Citroën introduces the Traction Avant, featuring front wheel drive and unitary construction.  Citroën becomes bankrupt and is taken over by the Michelin Tire Company.
  1934 - Matford begins building Ford cars, but ceases in 1939. In 1947, the company is reorganized as Ford SAF and sells cars under the Ford name.
  1936 - While the British and German economies powered ahead during the 1930s, growth in the French economy was at best tentative, with a period of destructive strikes and economic paralysis during the middle years of the decade. In Germany the Hitler government treated the German auto-industry to a central role in a radical economic strategy driven by what can be seen as a Keynesian approach to "fiscal stimulus". In 1936 France fell from second to third place among Europe's auto-producing nations, recording production of 204,000 cars, while Germany's production amounted to 213,117 passenger cars.
  1945 - Renault becomes state owned and is called “Régie nationale des usines Renault (RNUR)”.
  1945 - The Pons Plan reflected government determination to structure the French auto-industry according to priorities identified by politicians and civil servants.
  A select group of auto manufacturers is favored.  A punitive fiscal horsepower tax is imposed on larger engines leading to the demise of most of the Grandes Routières such as Bugatti, Delage, Delahaye, Hotchkiss et Cie, Salmson and Talbot-Lago by the mid-1950s.
  1946 - Renault introduces the Renault 4CV model.
  1948 - Citroen introduces the Citroen 2CV model, a small front-wheel drive saloon marketed as a "people's car" in the same vein as Germany's Volkswagen Beetle.
  1948 - Peugeot introduces the Peugeot 203 model.
caption: 1937 delage D8 120 Aerosport Coupe
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon EOS 40D", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "2000", "Image YResolution": "2000", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS4 Windows", "Image DateTime": "2014:02:24 21:12:42", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "248", "GPS GPSVersionID": "[2, 2, 0, 0]", "Image GPSInfo": "980", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1094", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "7094", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/1600", "EXIF FNumber": "9/2", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "200", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2014:02:23 08:19:43", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2014:02:23 08:19:43", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "85/8", "EXIF ApertureValue": "35/8", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "28", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2607", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2092", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "Interoperability RelatedImageWidth": "3888", "Interoperability RelatedImageLength": "2592", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "924", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "324000/73", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "2592000/583", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Manual Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}